Dictionaries page

  Difficulty: Expert   Keywords: Books & Publications

If you want overviews on Go, rather than comprehensible fragments, one place to seek them would be the major reference works. This is not likely to be helpful to beginners, naturally enough.

Table of contents

Nihon Ki-in's dictionary series

The structure of the Nihon Ki-in's dictionary series is revealing:

Top Level

These are anonymous corporate works, typically priced at 24000 yen for a large volume of 1000 pages in a slipcase.

Middle Level

/Chinese translation version name 《布局辞典》林海峰 上下

These are all in two smaller-format volumes, about 500 pages per volume, typical price per volume 2300 yen. The Joseki Dictionary is the updated version of the Ishida Joseki Dictionary. Volume 1 of the Cho book has been translated as the two volumes All about life and death. None of the rest has been translated into English. The Rin book has some recent material but is mostly about fuseki theory up to the mid-1970s. Volume 1 of the Fujisawa book is one of the important books to study at dan level.

Introductory Level

There are ten Small Dictionaries. pocket size, about 220 pages and 900 yen. No authors, marketed also as 'Quick' guides. Topics:

Five of the series books have been translated into English, by Yutopian.

Previous series

A previous series of dictionaries (from the 1970s, another publisher [publisher name 誠文堂新光社]) comprises much very good material. It included

/《ヨセ辞典》 加納嘉徳 誠文堂新光社 1974 ;《官子辞典》加納嘉徳 理艺出版社

/現代定石活用辞典(上中下) 呉清源 誠文堂新光社 1976

Comments

The Joseki Dictionary here is the Small one, a cut-down version of the Igo Daijiten.

The Takagawa Fuseki Dictionary is quite different from Rin's. Where Rin's dictionary is a broad survey of fuseki practice up to the 70's, Takagawa's is much more an exposition of how he sees fuseki. Like all experienced pros he has tried all kinds of fuseki in his career. In this dictionary most of the example games are with him playing either Black or White.

There is little enough in the Japanese dictionary material that tells one about the middle game. One series of books that addresses this is the Igo Dan Players Series, initially over eight volumes - but perhaps not quite up to the editorial standards of a dictionary.

The progression here seems clear enough: towards the top amateur levels, you can get something about openings and tesuji from books; for the rest you are thrown back on the abundant supplies of pro games and problem collections.

A Korean series

For comparison, the titles of a Korean dictionary-style series, probably on the same general level as the Small Dictionaries.

  1. Handicap Baduk
  2. Trick Plays
  3. 3-3 Invasions
  4. 4-4 and 3-4 Openings
  5. Middle Game and Strategy
  6. Invasion and Reduction
  7. Poseok (i.e. fuseki)
  8. Haengma
  9. Soksu (bad style)
  10. Endgame

This has a different feel entirely - certainly more pragmatic, oriented towards fighting. The contrast only goes to support the general argument put forward by John Fairbairn on the Haengma / Discussion topic. There is new thinking coming out of Korea about the way to organise the material of Go/Baduk.


Other Joseki dictionaries

There have been a number of joseki dictionaries down the years. One that is cited elsewhere on SL is

There are certainly others, by Takagawa, Miyashita Shuyo. Of course the information in these compilations is uneven, and of limited value as a reference unless you want to make your own comprehensive study of some joseki.

A 1998 one-volume

seems not to be at all well known.

Charles Matthews

BobMcGuigan: A small dictionary-like text on joseki that should not be lost sight of is

three volumes, published in Japan by Koma Shobo in 1981. It has a lot of insightful Kajiwara-style thinking.


[1] Yose Jiten/Errata

[2] Sakusen Jiten in Japanese. AKA Fighting Dictionary.

[3] Dave Sigaty: The Tesuji Dictionary by Segoe and Go is classic. Anyone who has the chance should grab it.


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